[1] The newspaper has been attacked several times; a number of its staff have been murdered by paramilitary groups and other forces, and it regularly receives threats.

[4] As the civil war escalated newspapers published from Jaffna came under pressure from both government forces and the rebel militant groups.

[4] Uthayan was shut down by the Sri Lankan government on 19 May 2000 using the recently passed draconian law – the Emergency (Miscellaneous Provisions and Powers) Regulation No.1 of 2000.

[7][8] Sub-editor N. Vithyatharan was interrogated by the police for two hours at his offices 20 January 2001 regarding an interview with Anton Balasingham, the LTTE's chief negotiator and political advisor.

[34] Journalist Selvarajah Rajivarnam, an Uthayan reporter for six months prior to his death, was shot dead in Jaffna close to a military checkpoint on 29 April 2007.

[43][44][45] Same year, on 25 June, thousands of copies of the Uthayan, Thinakkural and Valampuri were burnt in the street by armed men, after the papers had refused to print a statement against the LTTE.

[48] On 29 July, the same year, Uthayan's chief news editor Gnanasundaram Kuganathan was brutally attacked as he walked home from the office in Jaffna.

[53] Between 2006 and 2010 Kuganathan lived in the Uthayan offices out of fear for his life but had recently moved back to his family home after assurances were given by the government.

[50] Nagesh Pratheepan and two other Uthayan distributors were attacked and newspapers torched by four men on two motorbikes on 10 January 2013 as they were distributing them in the Valvettithurai area.

[62] Ten days later, on 13 April 2013, three men came to the paper's office in Jaffna and threatened security guards before damaging equipment and setting the printing press ablaze.

[63][64][65] "These attacks on the offices of Uthayan have been going on for years and typify the threats faced by the Tamil press in Sri Lanka," said CPJ Asia Program Coordinator Bob Dietz.

[67] "As we continue our free the press campaign we will highlight the case of Uthayan, a Tamil language newspaper in Sri Lanka.

Uthayan has seen its personnel beaten, its newspaper shipments burned, its equipment destroyed and its offices set ablaze in the past month alone.

[70] "The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) joins partners and affiliates in Sri Lanka in unequivocally condemning the repeated targeting of the Tamil newspaper Uthayan..........

[71] "The newspaper has supported self-rule for Tamils and its staff has repeatedly faced threats and violence, the most serious in 2006 when gunmen stormed its offices and killed two staffers.

[76] In its August 2007 report The International Press Freedom Mission to Sri Lanka describes the Uthayan as "a heroic paper".

Its staff have been threatened by several Tamil armed groups, including the EPRLF and the EPDP, that have been fighting in Jaffna for the past 20 years, and in 1999 paramilitaries threw a grenade into its offices.